Team 456 Weather Balloon Launch

[ChuckDickerson]

Each year Team 456 helps put on a couple of local week long STEM camps called GEMS (Gains in Education in Math and Science). Today is the last day of the second camp week. Team 456 is assisting with a weather balloon launch today to wrap up GEMS II summer camp.

It has been a coordinated effort with local HAM radio opperators, FAA, etc.
We are go for launch about 11:00AM Central Time if the weather holds.

If you are interested in tracking the balloon click here: http://aprs.fi/?call=N5VEI-11&&#8203...timerange=3600 or go to http://aprs.fi/ and search for call sign N5VEI-11

Have any other teams done something similar? BTW: we would love it it the balloon lands near some team if they would assist us in locating and retreaving it!

Thanks,
Chuck
KE5PYL

[rsisk]

We have a young man who joined our team this year that also launches balloons. Check out his web site here: http://brendengeary.squarespace.com/

[ChuckDickerson]

Well, it launched, but we must have had a transmitter failure because the tracking isn't working. We effectively had a good time sending a pink styrofoam box up with a big balloon. Oh, well, maybe we will have better luck next time.

If anyone finds a pink styrofoam box with a 3' orange and white parachute in Eastern Louisiana let me know...

[sanddrag]

Did you include contact info on/in it?

[ChuckDickerson]

Originally Posted by sanddrag

Did you include contact info on/in it?

Yep. The flight prediction model had it landing somewhere near Newellton, LA which is pretty open farm land. Hopefully it landed in a soybean or cotton field rather than a corn field and a farmer will find it before it gets run over by a tractor.

Oddly enough, our utter failure has sparked great enthusiasm about trying again. We are taking the lessons learned and are already planning to try again but next time with redundant tracking systems.

[ChuckDickerson]

Well after our epic fail last year due to a loss of tracking telemetry we gave it another shot this year and it was a huge success! We used redundant tracking systems this time and were able to recover the payload of, among other things, 3 GoPro HD cameras (up, down, and side views). We put together a short video which is available on our team YouTube channel or direct YouTube link. Check it out and let us know what you think! (Be sure and watch in 720p HD)

We had a lot of fun, learned a LOT, and are already planning for bigger and better next time!

[AllenGregoryIV]

Chuck,

That is awesome, the video is very cool. This is an amazing summer project.

- Allen

[rachelholladay]

Thats awesome Mr. Chuck! The ballon gave some really neat looking footage. Was that you towards the end of the video shooting the ballon to get it down from being stuck in the tree?

[ChuckDickerson]

Originally Posted by rachelholladay

Was that you towards the end of the video shooting the ballon to get it down from being stuck in the tree?

Yeah, but I wasn't shooting the balloon, or parachute, or the payload, and certainly not Einstein! I cut the limb they were hung up on and brought the whole package down together. You can see the limb come down at the end of the video. I hit it each time but it took 4 shots to cut it in two since it was about 3/4" in diameter. I could have shot the suspension line between the payload and the parachute but that would have left the balloon, the parachute, and most importantly Einstein in the tree and we couldn't leave Einstein behind!

BTW: Galileo is already in pilot training for the next launch!